Friday, February 29, 2008

Liam's Road to Nowhere

When Liam was six months old, he started growling. It was frightening how much it sounded like he was auditioning for a bit part in the Exorcist or chanting REDRUM over and over again. It scared the bejesus out of me. When he was about a year old, his father finally realized he was making that horrible sound whenever he heard an engine, be it a jet in the sky, a boat on the lake, or our own car downshifting. Ever since we realized that, it has been like a lightbulb went on...OUR BOY LOVES CARS.

As is the case with most toddlers, love of cars, has spread contagiously to love of trucks, trains, wagons, bikes, motorcycles, basically anything with wheels. And now, at a year and a half (I almost typed 18 months, but read something recently about how people HATE it when you give them your child's age in months), has started to name the various vehicles...

BOOOOOOOOOAT - this is the latest addition and is, by far, my favorite. Lest you miss it from my spelling, he draws out the O for a very long time and his little rosebud lips form a tiny o themselves...awwwwwwww) TRACTOR - nobody but immediate family could recognize that he is saying tractor, but, it's contextually correctCAR (sounds like he is from Boston as he drops the R sound and shortens the A)Train, which he calls TOOT TOOTSTRUCK - Sounds an awful lot like sockBIKE - Sounds suspiciously like BYEJust recently he's starting saying BEEP BEEP CAR...which I almost want to call a sentence until my mother reminds me that it's really just two nouns hanging out together...oh well.

Since everybody latched on to Liam's love of vehicles, he has been getting wheeled gifts. Planes, trains and automobiles aplenty. We are running out of room at the house which must be makeshift roundhouse, hanger and garage. (And, if one considers his sisters obsessions, jungle, barn, zoo and kennel as well). It's mighty crowded over here.

So, anytime of day, Liam can be seen with a wheeled vehicle in each hand. Whenever his mother, grandmother, aunt or Boppa (grandpa) sits still for a moment, we become his road. He rolls his train or car or truck all over our legs. Some more compliant relatives stretch out yoga-style on the floor to make a full clover leaf of roads for Liam. Others of us require him to use JUST our legs...NOT on our hands, faces, breasts please, Liam.

Liam is not yet a big talker. He's going through a stage where he makes this rather annoying, insistent question noise, but it's always the exact same noise with the exact same intonation. No words. It's almost a whine, unfortunately, so he doesn't always get the answers he desires. But, this morning he would not stop grunting and non-verbally prodding me until I spread the red cozy blanket, which we keep on the couch, over me...Once I did this, he started running his cars up and down my blanketed legs, smiling and growling peacefully. Apparently the cars run smoother on fleecy asphalt.